New Year, New Blog
Tuwo (Good Morning) and welcome to my blog,
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| Snorkeling around the Blue Hole |
I have spent the past 4 months serving as a Peace Corps
Volunteer in Kosrae, Federated States of Micronesia. One of my two New Year’s
resolutions this year is to keep an updated blog on my experiences as an
English Co-teacher/Co-planner and Peace Corps Volunteer in Kosrae. My other resolution is to read at least 1 book
each week. I’m going to first provide some background information about Kosrae
and then I’ll tell you a bit about my time on Kosrae.
Kosrae (pronounced KOSH-RYE) is a small, 42 square mile
island, in Micronesia. There are about 6,000 people living on the island. The
main language that is spoken here is Kosraen although due to English being
taught at 3rd grade up most adults can speak English. The main
religion on Kosrae is Kosrae Congregational. Kosrae is split up into four
districts Tafunsak, Lelu, Malem, and Utwe. Walung is a remote area of the
island that is more or less only accessible by boat ride and is part of
Tafunsak. I am currently working at Tafunsak Elementary School co-teaching 4th
and 5th grade English Reading and Writing. There are about 450
students at Tafunsak from Early Childhood Education (Kindergarten) to 8th
grade. Volunteers on Kosrae live with host families. My host mom works as the 6th
grade English teacher at Tafunsak Elementary School (TES) and my host dad works
for the Kosraen government. I have 4 host siblings between the ages of 7 and
13.
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| The view in Walung |
When I first arrived on Kosrae the island was coming out of
a severe drought due to the El Niño in 2015/2016. This had caused a lot of
damage to the island’s fruit trees, such as tangerines and oranges. However,
four months later I’m in a whole new green island. During the rainy season
(think northern hemisphere winter) it rains almost every single day and the
island turns into a lush green paradise. Every morning I wake up at 6am and
look out of my window, across the road, and to the beautiful white sandy beach.
Never in my life have I lived closer to the ocean. However, this also comes
with downsides. Last month we received a tsunami warning after a 7.8 Earthquake
in the Solomon Islands caused a pacific wide tsunami warning. Luckily we only
had a tide that was about a meter higher than normal but when I got the warning
I could see my life flash before my eyes.
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| Underwater wonder world |
Living with a host family after spending most of my life
away from my family is a strange experience. Growing up with my family moving
around several different countries my parents felt that it was best for me to
attend boarding school in order to have a stable environment as a result I
haven’t spent a full year living with my family since I was 7 years old. Moving
into an environment at the age of 22 where I have a curfew, have to inform my
family what I am doing and where I am going, and not being allowed to cook for
myself was a strange and unsettling experience at first. Having always prided
myself on being an independent woman I felt like I had lost a part of me.
However, I soon discovered how enjoyable living with a family could be and my
host siblings (although they are at least a decade younger than me) have become
some of my best friends on the island.
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| My host mom and I in our matching choir uniform |
Being on a religious island when one is not religious is an
interesting experience. When my oldest host brother asked me why I didn’t pray
before eating my dinner I told him “It’s because I’m not religious”. His
response to that was “So you’re Catholic…” I had to explain to him that not
being religious does not mean being Catholic and that not everyone believes in
god and that is okay. I enjoy attending the Kosraen church services and being a
part of the local celebrations. For Christmas this year I was a part of two
choirs that marched at the local Christmas celebrations. The first choir was a
family group and I was able to get to know some of my host family better. The second choir was the Etawi Fasr and is
the equivalent of a choir for 14-50 year olds in my community. We practiced for
days and our big performance was on the 28th of December we were the
last choir on the island to perform and thus went on at 12 am – 1:30 am. Whilst
I had a great time bonding and getting to know my community better I was
exhausted afterwards and lost my voice for two days.
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| TES's Christmas Celebration |
The teaching schedule for Tafunsak Elementary School is 8am
-12:20. During this period of time I teach and facilitate 6 classes and our
equivalent of homeroom. The children here are very enthusiastic but sometimes,
as a young woman, I have problems keeping their attention and they like to goof
off. It is only when my male co-teacher reprimands them or steps into the room
that they all pay attention. I’ve had a lot of fun trying different activities
with the kids. My students love playing Bananagrams, Scrabble, and doing word
hunts. My main difficulty in the classroom is not with my students but with
co-teaching and co-planning. Most teachers like to leave straight after school,
which results in difficulties lesson planning. I’ve tried to get around this by
sitting down with my counterparts and planning a week or two in advance. My
other frustrations with my school are an all too common problem on Kosrae and
other parts of the FSM, Teacher absence and teachers taking 20-minute breaks
in lessons to go on Facebook. I’m still trying to figure out a solution to
propose to the Vice Principal for this issue but so far I am thinking that
maybe a teacher of the month or quarter award would help this. Starting in January I am planning on starting
an English Game Club where students 3rd grade and up can come and
practice their English whilst playing board games. I’ll keep y’all updated on
how that goes.
I am going to sign off for now but I will be sure to keep
this blog updated and if you are interested please sign up to receive email
notifications when a new blog entry is posted.
Kuht Fah Ohsun (See you soon),
Sorcha
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